Management Of Strategic Change At The International Federation Of Red Cross And Red Crescent Societies

Abstract

Understanding and effectively managing change are the dominant themes of management today since change is the single most important element of successful business management. Organizations are increasingly feeling compelled to implement strategic changes to better adapt to evolving environmental challenges. Similarly, the International Federation had faced challenges some of which were inefficient service delivery to NS, increased magnitude and scales of disasters as well as reduced donor funding to the organization. In response to these challenges, the company undertook major changes to its operations. The purpose of this study was to establish change management practices applied by the International Federation. The study further sought to determine the challenges encountered during implementation. This study collected data from 15 respondents using an interview guide. The interviewees included the senior managers (The Head of Zone, Program Coordinator, Administration Manager, Human Resources Manager and the Information Technology and Telecom Manager) and junior staff from all the departments. Content analysis was used to analyze the qualitative data collected. From the research findings, it was concluded that the change management practices at the International Federation have not fully been in line with the popularly accepted practices in managing change. Communication for buy-in and empowering action was used although a lot needs to be done in regard to organizational acceptance, designing the right change management, sustainable change management and momentum as well as wider employee involvement at the initiation of reforms. These could minimize the behavioural resistance to change as witnessed. The respondents agreed that the main causes of resistance to change were fear of the unknown, retrenchment, lack of trust, satisfaction with the status quo and politics at the workplace.